A while back (OK, a year ago — I’m trying to get my email inbox under control again), David Fulton sent in a link to this image from the 52 back-up feature, History of the DCU.

The panel appears in part three of the story, which summarizes the events of Crisis on Infinite Earths and explains the original Multiverse. I’ve labeled the Flashes I recognize, but I believe the rest are new creations. The mask in the upper right with the goggles reminds me a little of the Crime Society Johnny Quick (who would not make his first appearance until the end of 52). The full face mask directly below Barry Allen reminds me a bit of the suit in the JLI Elseworlds Annual.

So why create new Flashes just for one-time cameos instead of using existing obscure characters? There actually weren’t that many alternate realities explored before Crisis — at least, not realities that were similar to the mainstream Earth-1/Earth-2 dynamic with DC’s major heroes. Once you got as far as Earth-4, they were dealing with the Charlton heroes, or the Quality heroes, or the Fawcett heroes, worlds that didn’t have a Flash.

They could have pulled in some examples from Grant Morrison’s “Second Crisis” story in Animal Man, or from some of the settings retroactively added to the pre-Crisis multiverse like Kingdom Come or the Tangent Comics Flash, but they may have wanted to stick with “real” characters who were actually around at the time of COIE. That leaves the Zoo Crew’s Fastback or the Justa Lotta Animals’ Crash, but they were going for a serious tone with this story. A talking turtle with super-speed might have spoiled the mood!

Ever since James Robinson mentioned that the JLA would be going up against the Crime Syndicate, I’d wondered which version of the villainous team they’d be facing. The original version? The Crime Society on Earth-3? Between this and Syndicate Rules in the previous series, it looks like the Morrison/Quitely version from JLA: Earth-2 has been established as the primary version of the team, though they have gone back to the Kyle Rayner analog for Power Ring.

Update: Here’s a close-up (loosely speaking) of part of the Jesse Quick/Johnny Quick battle.

CBR interviews Sholly Fisch about The All New Batman: The Brave and The Bold, which relaunches in November with art by Rick Burchett. In the first few issues, we can expect to see “Mad Hatter and Mirror Master teaming up to drag Batman and Flash through the looking glass.”

Over the weekend, Profiles in History auctioned off props from LOST, including two copies of a comic book that appeared in the TV show’s first season. That comic book was the Spanish-language edition of the first half of Green Lantern/Flash: Faster Friends (Part 1) from 1997.

In the show, Hugo “Hurley” Reyes brings the comic book onto the plane in Sydney. After the crash, Walt Lloyd finds it on the beach and carries it around, clinging to it as a symbol of the normal life he’s left behind.

Newsarama reports that the “crisp” copy used for the flashback scenes sold for $3,900, while the battered copy sold for $1,680. Profiles in History estimated the value of each book at $200–$300. Copies that haven’t appeared on television seem to sell for around $5–$10, judging by a quick eBay search for the English version.

Coincidentally, last week DC announced that they would be reprinting the story in November as part of their DC Comics Presents series.

DC has posted Ryan Sook [edit], Fernando Pasarin and Joel Gomez’ full Brightest Day image, featuring the twelve resurrected characters as White Lanterns. It’s made up of variant covers appearing on the Brightest Day-related comics this month and next, all aligned to create one complete picture.

Click through either image for the Source article, which includes a much larger version of the combined image. You really do have to see this thing full-sized.

Update: The Beat points out that the piece is inspired by Michelangelo’s famous painting on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Also, I forgot to include Fernando Pasarin, Joel Gomez, and Jim Lee in the credits. If I’m reading the Source post correctly, Lee did the overall design, Sook did the figures, and Pasarin and Gomez did the cosmic scene in the center (and possibly the thrones).